Monday, May 25, 2015

This weekend I'll be playing a pretty special show; one where we'll be saying farewell to one of the best musical projects South Africa has seen over the past few years. Gateway Drugs, The Cape Town kings of synth-pop, are calling it a day.

This is pretty heavy news. The Drugs have soundtracked some of my favourite moments over the past few years. From that time I used their song in that Michel Gondry video to the time they turned me into a sweaty mess on the Kitchener's dancefloor, these songs and I have had some grand times together. I'm pretty grateful that I get to be around on the night where they're played for the (let's hope not really) last time.

The farewell gig should be a pretty great one, with support from some of the best DJs the city has to offer. I'll be playing some records as Sassquatch, and playing some visuals with the band. Shit's gonna get emotional.

Thursday, May 21, 2015

Yesterday SMAC music launched "Rituals" our twelfth release, and the debut EP by Cape Town Trio Birthday Girl. It's a really fantastic, diverse collection of songs. Truly original, I won't even hazard a guess at what genre's I might be able to attach to the EP. Instead let me just direct your ears to the links below so you can have your own hard time trying to find words that match these sounds.

For easy repeat listens, head over to our bandcamp and download the EP. As always, the digital release is out on "pay what you want" model. Some kind of interesting physical release is on the cards too!

Birthday Girl are celebrating the launch of Rituals with their first live show on Sunday the 31st of May at Straight No Chaser. after many months of rehersal, it's going to be fantastic to see the guys unveiling thier live show - I think it's going to be something very special.

Thursday, May 14, 2015

Let's quickly address the fact that this place is a ghost-town. The reasons are way to complex to quickly unpack here, but if you've wondered what's happened to me, I'm investing most of my free time and energy into making games, and blogging about it here. After months of tumbleweeds, if there was something that could bring SMAC back from the grave, it would have to be great music. As luck would have it, that's exactly what we have right here.

Birthday Girl is the freshly unveiled, new musical project of Daniel Breiter (Fun Toy, HOOM), Dean Berger (Bateleur co-Founder) and Glenn Stein (Los Tacos). Late last year the guys handed me a collection of songs, that I swiftly found myself completely in love, and totally obsessed with. Many months, lots of hard work and much planning later, and we're all incredibly proud to be working together to bring these songs to The World in the form of Birthday's Girl's debut EP, Rituals.

Rituals will be out on Wednesday the 20th via our Bandcamp and Soundcloud. The 12th release by SMACM, we're unbelievably excited to be bringing this magic to people. The EP comes with (if we say so ourselves) pretty damn phenomenal art by Jeanne Fourie - the same creative force behind the mesmerizing animation above.Outside of this stellar debut EP, you can also look forward to Birthday Girl's live show, which looks set to be some magic of the highest order. Drop by the band's facebook if you want to keep trakc of where and when you can see "Rituals" conjured up on stage!

Tuesday, October 14, 2014

My brain is currently struggling to process how awesome life is going to get in a few days. On Saturday, some of my favourite humans will be closing the 14,661km distance currently standing between us. A few days later, I'll join them in doing the thing that makes the five of us most happy in this life; falling around a stage and singing and screaming and smiling together like five felines that broke into a catnip silo.

Looking forward to this tour, it hit me recently; Johnny Foreigner are the one band that I've (by far) spent the most time with. This is both on stages and off of them. This sounds insane for a dude from Pretoria and a band that live on the opposite end of the world, but it's true. Between two trips across the USA, a quest through Europe and a tour of the UK, I've easily played more shows (and covered more ground) with Jo Fo than I ever got to with Kidofdoom, Eyes Like Mirrors and Johnny Neon combined. I hold my travels with the band as some of my most treasured memories. And it's an adventure that started at home, with the string of dates that formed the band's 2010 SA Tour.

Four years on from that, I'm ecstatic to be getting the band back this incredible country. They're pretty pleased about this too. To put this tour together, I teamed up with one of my other favourite humans (hi Henk!) and together, we've arranged a pretty stellar set of shows (if I do say so myself!). Jo Fo will be playing some of my favourite spots, sharing stages with a truckload of other favourite humans (hey everyone!). Here's a breakdown of how Johnny Foreigner's "Trip Over Timezones SA 2014 Tour" will be playing out...

And that's that! Six opportunities for life-changing guitar antics and audio-visual joy!

We've poured our hearts and souls into making this tour happen. If you're reading this, it means we'd love to see you at one (or all) of the above dates. We're well aware that we're doing something pretty niche here, but I believe in this band and what we're doing with every molecule of my being. If you'd like to help us in this crusade, please spread this ghostly gospel far and wide. Tell you're friends, scream it while suspended from rooftops, scribble/ stick up/ spraypaint ghosts everywhere; Johnny Foreigner are coming back to The Promised Land!

Monday, September 29, 2014

I'll keep this short; (in my books) this EP is the best collection of new songs that has come out of South Africa in ages. It's available on a "pay what you want" model, so even if you're totally broke, you can brighten up your life with this sonic magic.

Thursday, September 25, 2014

Tonight Hi5 is hosting a family reunion.
We're re-assembling a gang of DJs and dancefloor-enthusiast that used
to get together every Thursday night between 2005 and 2007 (maybe into
08?). I, for one, can't wait to have the family back together. In
preparation, I trawled through some old photos, and found a bunch of us,
doing what we did best during those days. This is only 9-7 years ago,
but it feels like a very distant age...

Tuesday, September 23, 2014

For Hi5 13, we were really stoked to have Australia's Dune Rats make their return to our sweaty little dance party. Joburg band The Moths got things started. Awesome times ensued. Shot by Hi5's own Plaat Japie, here's what we have to show for all the carnage...